Life isn't always a fairy tale
by trinityvermillion
Summary: This is a AU combo story. The AUs are Wiccan! AU and modern AU. Don't worry though, the dragons will play a part and the parents of certain characters that we know of (a.k.a Gray and Lucy) are alive. However, Natsu, Wendy, Gajeel, Sting, and Zeref are sibilings and all share the same mom and dad. I hope you guys enjoy the story! (BTW, this is a gratsu story X3)
1. Prologue

My mom always told me these wonderful stories about magic and covens and the people who make up the covens. Ever since then, I have been intrigued with the idea of all of these things being real. Growing up, I always read books that had magic and fantasy and wonders galore in the pages. I refused to read anything else, or watch anything that didn't have magic. Even when my mom passed away, I still believed in magic. However, my dad started being very strict with me, and started telling me to grow up. But one day, everything changed. My 16th birthday, I learned something important about my family history.

I am the descendant of Anna Heartfilia, and great and gentle Wiccan.

My name is Lucy Heartfilia.

And this is my story.


	2. First Day Jitters (Gray's intro to Lucy)

Chapter 1

First Day Jitters

"Ahhh… Here we go, Gray. You can do this. First day of college, and you are going to do great. Nothing to be worried about." I say to myself, trying to keep my nerves calm. "Oh, who am I kidding. This campus is **HUGE**! I am so getting lost today. I should have gone to orientation. Why did I change my mind and head out of town with my siblings?! I need to use my baby brother powers of influence and my 'adorable baby face' to my advantage sometimes!"

I stare off at the many buildings that make up the Fairy Tail University campus. So many buildings that hold so many classrooms and four of my classes are in these buildings somewhere. And so many people are here too. I didn't think the student population of this school would be this big. Deciding to collect my thoughts, I step back until I hit a wall behind me. I then, start to take deep breaths, calming my nerves and relaxing my tense muscles. Suddenly, I see a flash of pink walking across the courtyard, looking a bit shaky and scared. Natsu Dragneel, Magnolia High's resident scaredy-cat, and one of my closest friends along with Erza Scarlet, Elfman Strauss, Rogue Cheney, Jellal Fernandes, and Meredy. God, he looks so cute today, not that he doesn't look cute every day. But, he's wearing a beanie with his glasses and an over-sized hoodie with his personalized messenger bag with the college's symbol on the front (link for reference). One can only imagine that he's wearing some anime tee under that hoodie. God, I want to see what he looks like without his clothes on, blushing profusely underneath me, squirming and whimpering and sweaty—WOAH! Let's stop those thoughts right now before it becomes a massive problem. Don't tell anyone else this, not even Natsu, but I like him. No, it's more like I love him. But the only thing is I don't know if he likes me back or not. And if he doesn't, I don't know what I would do. All of a sudden, a blonde-haired girl bumps into him, papers flying everywhere and Natsu falling to the ground. I hear her apologizing to him, sounding like she was scared that he would start panicking. All of a sudden, I hear him say, "It's ok Luce. You looked like you were in a hurry to get to your class on time. I really should've watched where I was going. I need to clean my glasses too, my most recent art project yesterday got the lenses covered a bit in paint. I'm going to get them replaced today after class. But it also doesn't help that I've got the "first-day jitters" as well, you know." "Luce" nods her head in understanding, like she's had the "jitters" before.

I make the decision to walk up to Natsu and the girl and offer them my help. "Hey Natsu, need some help?" I ask, making him jump a little, and his ears started turning red, indicating that his face is beet red. To be fair, I was right behind him and spoke in his ear kind of sensually. "G-G-G-Gray! W-What are you d-doing here?" Natsu stutters, sounding a little nervous to be talking to me. Then again, he does that whenever I'm around, even when our friends are around. But he hasn't truly known my friends for very long, so he is still a bit nervous around them. Except for Rogue, he's pretty calm around Rogue. Then again, Sting and Rogue are attached at the hip ever since they announced that they were dating at Natsu's graduation party. "N-No thanks, I've got it. Thanks for asking, though, but I've got to get going to my art class. Don't wanna be late on the first day, know?" Natsu says. He starts locating all of his papers that got knocked out of his hands when him and "Luce" ran into each other. "Oh, by the way, I need to introduce you two. Gray Fullbuster, this beautiful blonde in front of you is Lucy Heartfilia. She's the new neighbor I was telling you about on Skype last night when we were playing on our joint Minecraft server, 'member? Lucy Heartfilia, this tall, dark and handsome man you see is Gray Fullbuster. Don't worry, even though he does play hockey and soccer, and he meditates and does all this athletic stuff, he's a bigger dork than most of the people in our circle of friends that you'll ever meet. And that's including me!" Natsu adds, quickly walking away before I can interject and try and deny his statement. "Gotta get going! See ya guys later!"

And then he walked away, leaving me dumbfounded that he would openly tell someone that when me and said someone don't know each other that well. Why would he do something like that? Then again, it is Natsu that I'm talking about here. It no surprise to anyone that truly knows him. Despite being the shy, kinda small, scaredy-cat that people see when they first meet him, Natsu is pretty talkative and energetic. Also, he can be pretty vulgar when we're playing Minecraft. Like, really vulgar. Damn that Sting, corrupting my innocent little Natsu. Okay, probably shouldn't have said that he's mine because he isn't… yet. I turn to look at Lucy, now that I know what her actual name is instead of just always calling her Luce in my head. "So, your Natsu's new neighbor huh? What brings you to the small, run-down town of Magnolia?" I ask, curious as to why a girl like her is in a place like this. Seriously, this girl looks like she comes from a wealthy family. "Actually, it's Fairy Tail University! I've always dreamed of coming to a university this talked about in all of Fiore. One of my mom's old friends went to school here long ago and absolutely loved it. Plus, I've heard that there's a massive secret that all of the students share. I wonder what it is. My mom did tell me that I need to figure it out myself, but I don't know where to start looking. I was hoping to find someone who could help." She tells me. "My father initially didn't want me to come to a university like this, saying that the students often get to some crazy shenanigans during their time here, and things like that aren't appropriate for a lady of my status. But after some convincing from both my mother and me, he agreed to send me here with a few of our servants to keep me out of serious trouble and so I don't feel alone in the house he bought for me to live in during the school year." While she's telling me this, I can't help but wonder what she means by "lady of her status." And then, a crazy question pops into my head. "Hey, Lucy. Can I ask you something?" She looks at me, confused. "Sure, as long as you tell me about yourself when you're done. Natsu may have mentioned a little bit about you, but it's not enough for me to go off of." I nod in agreement and go in to ask my question. "Are you the daughter of Layla and Jude Heartfilia?"

She looks at me, and judging by the look; it's almost like my sister Kyra's famous "you are such an idiot" look. "Of course, I am. Why do you ask?" She says, very confused. My eyes widen in realization. She's the one; she's the Heartfilia family's powerful Wiccan.

She's Anna Heartfilia's descendant, and she doesn't even know it. Ladies and gentlemen, this year just got a whole lot more interesting.


	3. The princess in the dark with the dragon

_Sorry that this took so long! Things got a little crazy for me. Life, writer's block, crazy amounts of detail... This is probably the longest chapter I've written so far. But anyways, I hope you guys enjoy this chapter and thank you for your understanding!_

Third Person's P.O.V. (2 months before classes start)

"GAJEEL! Have you seen my sketchbook?! I thought I put it on my desk last night!" A panicked pink-haired teen shouted throughout the house, searching for said sketchbook that sat forgotten in the eldest raven-haired boy's room. "Natsu, you left it in my room last night, remember? You asked me how one of your drawings looked before I went to sleep. I made a few suggestions in my erasable red pen **(A/N: Erasable pens are a thing! I have one that I use for my college classes! It's a lifesaver!)** , so just make the adjustments and ask me for my pen so you can erase my writing." The pinkette stops his panicked search through the house and, calmly and slightly embarrassed, walks to his blood brother's room. You see, the pinkette and raven-haired teens in question, named Natsu and Zeref, are the only blood related kids of Norio and Estela Dragneel. **(A/N: Just to inform you readers, Norio is a Japanese name and Estela is Hispanic, because I wanted to give Natsu and Zeref a bit of Latino heritage. Norio means man of principles, kind of how I wanted to portray Natsu and Zeref's father, and Estela means star. (Should be obvious, but I thought I would add it if you didn't know.))** The Dragneel family is a family of 7, 5 kids and 2 parents. The other 3 children were adopted by Norio and Estela. Gajeel Redfox was adopted by the two at the age of 5, seven years after their first child, Zeref, was born. The second child to be adopted was Sting Eucliffe, who was only 4 years old, and was adopted 3 months before Natsu was born. The third and youngest of the family to be adopted was Wendy Marvell. Wendy was adopted when Natsu was only 3 years old, and Wendy was only 6 months old. Now, the ages of the kids are as follows: Zeref, 23 years old (and still helps out at home (he's a momma's boy and isn't afraid to admit it)), Gajeel, 21 years old (currently getting his engineering degree so he can fix cars and motorcycles (which is why he's at home in the story, he's going to the same university Natsu is)), Sting, 18 years old (and going to Sabertooth University, which is a 2-day drive from Magnolia), Natsu, also 18 years old (and "a little" afraid of being alone for extended periods of time, due to a very traumatic incident when he was only 3 years old (he can still remember it vividly at the worst times[1])), and Wendy, 15 years old (the family's little angel and the glue that holds the siblings together, even if a little anger is necessary).

When the kids were young, there weren't any problems and arguments that couldn't be solved with a little separation and a stern talking to, perhaps a time-out or two if things were really bad. But now, it's a miracle how the two parents of 5 survive. But don't get Norio wrong, there are some days he wants to strangle a couple of them, namely Natsu and Gajeel (those two fight over the dumbest things so often, and for the longest time too. One of their famous spats was about which Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle was better, Michelangelo or Donatello. They wouldn't talk to each other for 4 months once Zeref told them that all of the Ninja Turtles are great in their own way (So in a way, Zeref kind of made it worse). Norio really wanted to lock them in a room together and let them sort it out themselves around month 2, but Estela told him she was afraid they might strangle each other). But no matter what, Natsu cannot get mad at Wendy. He treasures her, desperate to protect her. She is his only younger sibling (because Norio and Estela agreed on 1 more child after 4 boys), and the two of them can get away with almost anything, thanks to their youngest child powers. They were the ones who convinced Mom and Dad to let the kids get pets. Zeref got a dog that he named Invel, and the other four got kittens. Gajeel named his black Bombay kitten Pantherlily, Sting named his burgundy Maine Coon kitten Lector, Natsu named his Russian Blue kitten Happy, and Wendy named her white Persian kitten Carla.

Anyway, back to Natsu. He entered Zeref's room, searching for his sketchbook. He thought it would be placed on his brother's desk, only to find the area completely empty. Natsu looks over at Invel, who looks like he's smirking at Natsu. "You little-! Where did you put my sketchbook?!" Natsu shouts at the dog. All of a sudden, Natsu hears the sound of a car door slamming shut. _What the-?_ Natsu thinks. _Is Igneel here? He's not supposed to be coming until the beginning of August. Wait, is that a moving van in the driveway of the house next door? Why didn't anyway tell me we were getting new neighbors?_ With all these thoughts running through his head, he decides to head outside to investigate the sound. Natsu opens the front door and walks out onto his front steps, seeing Happy asleep on the lemonade stand that Wendy made back in July when the weather started to get hotter. When he looks up, sure enough, there's a moving van in the driveway next door. _I wonder who our new neighbors are,_ Natsu thinks to himself, suddenly remembering what happened to him long ago, _I hope they aren't untrustworthy. Maybe I should ask Zeref to come with me._ All of a sudden, Natsu sees someone exit the house, and realizes that the person is a young, blonde girl. She was panting and sweaty due to the heat. _What the heck? The weatherman said it wasn't supposed to be crazy hot today!_ Natsu thinks to himself as the sunlight enters his peripheral vision through his glasses. _Y'know what? Why not lend her a hand? She looks like she could use some help, and it looks like she's moving in by herself anyway._ He walks across his yard and over to the house next door. He sees the girl leaning against the doorframe of her new house and walks over to the moving van parked in the driveway. He picks up a box, that appears to contain some of her books, or maybe fragile things in a box that was previously used in another move when she was younger. As he starts walking up the driveway, his footsteps grab her attention. "Hey, need some help? I'm Natsu Dragneel, by the way. Natsu Dragneel." She smiles at his offer, thankful that someone wants to help her move in. She was sent alone, wishing that her father would've allowed a few of her servants to come with her to her help her move in. "Thanks, I could use it! My name is Lucy, Lucy Heartfilia. Your new neighbor." _Heartfilia? Like… Anna Heartfilia? This girl… couldn't possibly be her… descendant… right?_ Natsu thinks to himself, shocked at hearing her last name. He shakes the thought off and continues to help her move the boxes into her house, making a mental note to ask Zeref about it later. As the last box was placed in the empty living room, Lucy then asked Natsu if he could help her move her furniture in when she buys it. He agreed, and even said that he could try and get his brothers to come and help. As he was about to walk out the door, a question pops into his head. "Hey Lucy, would you like to come over for dinner later? My mom loves meeting new people, and she would adore you." Lucy smiles, going to her new neighbor's house for dinner, and she gets to meet his family? "Yeah, that sounds fantastic. I would love to come over for dinner. And from what you've told me so far, your family sounds wonderful, even if Gajeel is a giant thorn in your side." Lucy says, a gentle smile spreading across her face. Natsu looks at her, a bit of shock in his eyes. Not all of the neighbors they've ever had called the whole Dragneel family wonderful before. Even though his coven name is Salamander, people think Natsu is some kind of destructive demon or something. If you truly get to know Natsu, you would know that's not the case. Natsu smiles, "Great! Dinner's at 6:30, so if you show up at about 4:30 or 5:00, that would be awesome!"

"Sure thing Natsu! I'll see you soon!" Lucy said, walking into her house to figure out what to wear. "Oh, and wear something kinda nice but not too fancy. My mother doesn't like it when people try too hard to impress her when they first meet her." Natsu adds, fully knowing of his mother's Latina background. "I'll try my best. It's going to be difficult though, most of my clothes are fancy." Lucy states, remembering all of the fancy dresses her and Natsu packed into her empty room. Natsu smiles, remembering all of the boxes of clothes he packed into Lucy's house, and the few that had garment bags on top of them. "Oh… Yeah… Forgot about that. Well, just throw something together that doesn't look like a fancy dress and you'll be fine. Oh, I forgot to mention! I hope you don't mind Pagans and magic and such, cause… that's what my family is. Well, that's our religion at least." "Really? Your whole family is Pagan? My mom's side of the family is too! But my dad doesn't like to talk to them, not after she… passed away when I was 6." Lucy said, slowing her words down at the mention of her mother. Natsu could feel the mood in the room change from a happy one to depressing at the drop of a hat, and he could see the color of Lucy's aura change. "W-Well, maybe this will be good for you! Being around a full family, I mean." Natsu said quickly, his words fumbling together. Lucy smiles, taking in the adorable mess in front of her. _He's such a nice guy. I hope he finds someone who will care for him. What am I thinking? He'll find a nice guy; I know he will._ Lucy thinks to herself, remembering what Natsu told her earlier.

When Natsu was helping Lucy move her stuff in

 _"_ _So Natsu, why don't you tell me a little bit about yourself. If you're comfortable, that is." Lucy asked as Natsu came through the front door with two fairly heavy boxes. "A-Are you sure you wanna here about my life? It's really not that interesting, trust me." Natsu smiles, "Of course I'm sure! It never bothers me to learn about someone new. In fact, I find it interesting. You never truly know someone until you ask them, right?" Lucy stares at Natsu in awe, his words sounding like those of a famous author of one of her favorite books. Who knew that Natsu had such a way with words. She then smiles and starts telling Natsu everything he could ever want to know about her. He then returned the favor, but only what he felt comfortable talking about, to which Lucy understood. She could tell that Natsu looked uncomfortable when he was telling certain parts of his story, and she didn't wanna push him too far. "Wow, I didn't know that Commander Atlas was your uncle! He was one of the greatest soldiers in Fiore's army!" Lucy says, her eyes lighting up with excitement. "Yeah, now he's working at the same training camp he did military training at. Says it helps with his PTSD." Natsu states. Lucy nods in understanding, her butler Capricorn suffers from some minor PTSD from losing his family in a shooting in the mall where he used to live. He never really talked about it, as it is a dark time in his life, but he mentioned a bit of it to Lucy when she had a school assignment to write about someone they know or someone their parents work with. It's nothing bad, he just has some controllable moments at random times. Natsu fidgets a bit, then decided to tell Lucy, "There is something that I am willing to talk about that I don't really tell anyone that I just met… I have Irregular Sleep-Wake Rhythm, meaning that my sleep patterns are irregular when I am trying to sleep. There are some nights where I can get a proper night's sleep, it only happens around finals week at school and when I have something really important coming up in the week. It's something my family has been trying to help me with ever since I was diagnosed with it back in middle school." Lucy stood there in the empty living room, shell-shocked that there's someone out there dealing with one of the many sleeping disorders her mother was researching before she died. Here she is standing in her living room with one of her new neighbors, and she was just told about a sleeping disorder that he has that her mom was researching many years ago! All of a sudden, Natsu perked up and was practically stiff as a board before he said goodbye to Lucy. "Sorry Luce, I gotta go. Mom's calling us for dinner." He rushed out the door, "Hopefully I can help you more tomorrow! But I'll see you in a bit to meet my family!" Natsu flashes his classic cheeky grin and ran back to his house next door. Lucy giggled, waving goodbye and saying that she'll be over in 30 minutes._

And now here she is, standing in her room, looking through boxes of clothes to try and find something nice to wear, but nothing too fancy, remembering what Natsu said about his mother. She settles on a green sweater, black skirt and leggings, and black converse. To accessorize, she adds a heart-shaped necklace, some heart earrings, a black leathermetal bracelet, and a Celeste hair comb. Deciding on only a small amount of make-up, Lucy finishes getting ready and heads out her front door, feeling the heat of a Magnolia July cool down for the evening. Walking across her little yard in front of her house, she sees a dog in the front yard of Natsu's house. _It's an all-white Siberian Husky. That must Natsu's older brother Zeref's dog, Invel. He doesn't seem all that bad like Natsu makes him out to be._ Lucy giggles to herself, _Maybe Natsu was just being dramatic._ As Lucy walks up the steps to the front door, Invel follows her, sniffing at her feet and up to her knees. Invel can sense that Lucy will be here quite often soon, so he might as well get used to her scent being around the house. Feeling Invel at her legs, Lucy looks down at the dog and smiles. She squats down slightly and pets Invel's head, scratching behind his ears and making him lean into her touch. It makes her remember when she had a dog growing up. A cocker spaniel named Maddie, and she was there long before Lucy was born. Her name was Maddie, and she was the gentlest dog you would ever meet. Maddie always loved to be pet, and she always loved bath time too because Lucy would always join her in the little kiddie pool they set up just for Maddie. _I wonder if they do the same thing… I'll have to ask Natsu._ Lucy thinks to herself, making a mental note in the process. She then decides to knock, the sound of people shouting prevalent to her before her fist even hits the door. After she knocks, she hears someone shout from what appears to be from towards the back of the house, possibly the kitchen. Next thing I know, Natsu opens the door with such high energy and bouncing feet. "Lucy! You made it! Come on in!"

Lucy walks in cautiously, "Thank you for having me!". Pulling off her shoes to be polite, Lucy slowly takes in her surroundings. 5 cats, all running around chasing a remote-controlled car with a yarn mouse attached to the bumper of the car, a teal-haired girl holding the remote to the car, a black-haired boy and a blonde boy playing a video game on a fairly large flat-screen tv, another black-haired boy (seemingly older than the rest) reading something in a folder, a smaller blue-haired girl sitting at the dining table doing homework, and two women, a shorter blonde woman and a black-haired woman, in the kitchen cooking and chatting. Walking down the stairs was an older man, who Lucy assumed was Natsu's father, reading something on his phone.

The black-haired woman looks over at Lucy and smiles, "Oh, hello there! You must be our new neighbor Lucy! Natsu was telling us all about you. Have a seat anywhere you can find room, dinner will be ready soon." The woman, presumably Natsu's mother, said.

 _Welp_ , Lucy thought to herself, _I'm in for quite the treat tonight._

* * *

[1] This is actually a psychological thing. It's called "infantile amnesia", and it's where you can only remember things as far back as age 3. Basically, from birth to 3 years old, you don't remember anything. 3 years old and onward, you can remember everything that you need or want to remember, and things that you don't want to remember (i.e., traumatizing memories). YAY FOR TAKING 3 PSYCHOLOGY CLASSES! Having this knowledge is going to make this story very interesting.


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